Method of manufacturing bias fabric



g- 9, 1932- R. J. FORD METHOD OF MANUFACTURING BIAS FABRIC OriginalFiled Oct. 2. 1929 INVENTOR E0367? JTI'O d Y B Patented An le, 1932 FICEROBERT J. FORD, OF BRISTOL, RHODE ISLAND, ASSIGNO'B TO NATTONAL INDIARUBBER COMPANY, OF BRISTOL,-RHODE ISLAND, A CORPORATION OF RHODE ISLANDMETHOD OF MANUFACTURING BIAS IEABIBCIIICI' Original application filedOctober 2, 1929, Serial No. 396,599. Divided and this application filedJuly 26*,

1930. Serial No. 470,792.

This invention relates to the art of footwear manufacture, moreparticularly to the process of making such side stays.

Heretofore in the manufacture of rubber fabric footwear the upper is cutto proper shape from fabric and the side stays aflixed thereto bysewing. The side stays heretofore used have been made from plain squarewoven fabric having a surface layer of rubber by dieing out side staysto the proper shape or curvature so that .they may be applied to thefront margin of the fabric upper without bending or wrinkling. It haspreviously been considered necessary to so form side stays because ofthe double curvature and the magnitude of the curvature of the frontmargin of a rubber fabric shoe upper. That curvature is such thatordinary straight rubber fabric strips cannot be twisted to conform tothe curvature without wrinkling of the strip to a degree which renderedit impossible to satisfactorily sew thestrip to the upper.

The customary method of making and applying side stays to fabric uppersas above described is objectionable in that there is a large amount ofscrap created in the operation of dieing out the stays to form a rubberfabric sheet. Such loss has amounted to approximately 25% of the rubberfabric sheet. In addition, due to the fact that the strips are died out,it has been impractical to prepare the strips in lengths greater thanthat to be applied to one shoe so thatthe applicationof the side staysto the uppers proceeded one upper at a time. In addition the old processis unnecessarily expensive due to the operations involved in the dieingout of the stay.

It has also been customary in the manufacture of rubber fabric footwearheretofore first to apply-the died out stay to the upper by sewing andthen to unite a tongue, previously cut from fabric, to the upper by aseparate stitching operation. This method of applying tongues to up ersis unnecessarily expensive and the ouble stitching operation makes theshoe unsightly.

The present application is a division of my application entitledImprovements in method of manufacturing footwear and article, Serial No.396,599, filed October 2, 1929. The object of this invention is toprovide a material of such a nature that a straight strip thereof may beadjusted in conformity with the front margin of a fabric upper andstitched thereto without the formation of wrinkles. Other objects andadvantages of the present invention will appear in the followingdetailed description taken in connection with the accompanying drawin inwhich:

igure 1 isa diagrammatic view of certain parts of a rubber fabricarticle of footwear at a certain stage of manufacture; Fig. 2 is adiagrammatic view illustrating the method of manufacturing rubber fabricstrips to be used as side stays for rubber fabric footwear.

Referring to the drawing, an upper or a series of uppers 1 are cut toshape from fabric. A back stay 2 may be applied and a' cuff 3 may beformed either before or after the application of the side stay 4.

According'to this invention the side stay 4 is in the form of a straightstrip of rubber coated fabric which is arranged on and in conformitywith the front margin 5 of the uppers. The strip is then stitched to theupper preferably by a four needle sewing machine thereby forming tworows of stitches 6 on each side of the stay and securely uniting thestay to the upper in one operation.

The side stay 4 may thus be applied to a single upper if desired.However, due to the factthat the side stay 4 is applied in the form of astraight strip arranged to conform to the front margin of the upper, itis convenient and of. advantage to arrange a plurality of the uppers insuccession as shown in Fig. l and continuously sew the strip of rubbercoated After severing tape, top of stay is stitched or closed in withseparate tacking machine to prevent fraying of stay under wear andpresent finished appearance.

Due to the ease with which the strip of rubber coated fabric is appliedto form the side stays of the upper, it is possible according to thisinvention simultaneously to stitch the tongue 7 to the upper in the sameoperation, the tongue 7 having previously been cut to shape from fabric.This operation is carried out by arranging the tongues in assembledrelation with their respective uppers and by arranging the rubber coatedstrip 4 to follow the contour of the front margins of the uppers andthen stitching the strip 4 to the upper and stitching the tongue to theupper in the saine continuous operation passing from upper to upper insuccession as before described.

Due to the magnitude of the curvature of the front margins of theuppers, and the fact that the curvature is a double one, together withthe fact that the said stay is a rather wide strip, it has beenimpossible to carry out this process with strips of rubber coated fabricheretofore known. Therefore a process of making a novel rubber stripcapable of being used to form the side stay 4 has been devised. Thisprocess consists in first applying a coating of rubber to a square wovenfabric 10 which rubber may be applied, and preferably is, by spreading apaste of rubber in organic solvents or a thickened latex on to thesurface of the fabric, using the usual spreading knife. Such arubberized square woven fabric 'is 7 then bias cut at approximately intosections as indicated at 11 in the drawing. Such sections of rubberizedsquare woven fabric are arranged with the side margins in juxtaposition.For reasons which will later appear, it is preferred to place the sideedges of the sections 11 in butt relation, although the side edges ofthe sections may be slightly over.- lapped with some attendantdisadvantages, but without departing from this invention. The juxtaposedside edges of the sections 11 are then sewed together preferably byazigzag stitch as indicated at 12 in Fig. 2 of the drawings, therebyforming a sheet of bias cut rubberized square woven fabric.

The rubber coated rubberized fabric is then slit into strips asindicatedat 13 in Fig. 2 of the drawing, which strips are employed to form theside stays for fabric uppers.

While specific forms of the invention have been disclosed by way ofillustration, it is not intended so to limit the invention inasmuch asvariations in the details of the processes described may be made withoutdeparting from the scope of the invention which is indicated in thefollowing claims.

Having thus described my invention, what I claim and desire to protectby Letters Patent is:

1. The method of making stays for footwear having fabric uppers whichcomprises coating fabric with rubber, bias cutting the rubberized fabricinto sections, uniting the edges of the sections to form a sheet ofbiascut rubberized fabric, then placing a layer of rubber onto the sheetof rubberized fabric to form a composite sheet, and thereafter slittingthe composite sheet lengthwise into strips 2. The method of making staysfor footwear having fabric uppers which comprises spreading rubber on tosquare-woven fabric, bias cutting the rubberized fabric into .sections,arranging the sections with their edges in butt relation, sewing thesections to ether to form a sheet of bias-cut rubberized abric,

'then attaching a layer of rubber on to the sheet of rubberized fabricto form a composite sheet, and thereafter slitting the composite sheetlengthwise into strips.

3. The method of making stays for footwear having fabric uppers whichcomprises bias cutting a square woven fabric into sections, unitingtheed es of the sections to form a sheet of bias cut fa ric, then placing alayer of rubber on to the sheet to form a composite sheet, andthereafter slitting the composite sheet lengthwise into strips.

Signed at Bristol, count of Bristol, State of Bhode Island, th1s 22n dayofv July 1930.

' ROBERT J. FORD.

This sheet of fabric is then coated with a layer of rubber by passingthe sheet through an even motion calender. 'Thelayer of rubber isapplied to the fabric by an even motion calender in order to avoid theapplication of any tension to the fabric which would, due to the factthat it is bias cut, cause it to be pulled out of shape. The-buttjointbetween the sections 11 of square woven fabrc also aids in thiscalendering operation for the through e set up pull the fabric out ofshape,

a calender would cause forces to which would cause it to wrlnkle andpreventthe properapplication of the rubber layer thereon.

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